Objections to tax breaks for proposed Sullivan resort

Saturday

Dec 14, 2013 at 2:00 AM

FALLSBURG — One member of the Sullivan County Industrial Agency is questioning whether the IDA should give tax breaks on infrastructure improvements to a $120 million resort project in Fallsburg before a 100-room hotel is ready to be built.

Leonard Sparks

FALLSBURG — One member of the Sullivan County Industrial Agency is questioning whether the IDA should give tax breaks on infrastructure improvements to a $120 million resort project in Fallsburg before a 100-room hotel is ready to be built.

At an IDA meeting on Tuesday, board member Sandy Shaddock criticized Manhattan investor Misa Chang's request for $350,000 in sales tax breaks on work to upgrade a sewer plant and extend sewer and water lines at Davos in Woodridge.

Chang is proposing to use money from foreign investors to construct the hotel as the first phase of a project that would grow to include condominiums, an 18-hole golf course, a greenhouse and a winery at the site.

Fallsburg town officials want the infrastructure work, which would bring sewer service to existing homes at Davos that are now using troubled septic systems, completed before a hotel is constructed.

"What sort of remedy do we have if they go ahead with the infrastructure and the hotel project never happens?" said IDA board member Sandy Shaddock. "It's not economic development; it's not job creation."

Chang's Vodas LLC is looking to start infrastructure work next spring and began constructing the hotel in fall 2014.

She estimates that the project would create 1,744 direct jobs.

Chang is banking on funding from Chinese investors through the federal EB-5 program, which lets wealthy foreigners get fast-tracked green cards in exchange for investing up to $1 million in projects that might create jobs in the United States.

Fallsburg officials are concerned that Chang would build the project without adequate sewer and water, town Supervisor Steve Vegliante said.

"Our concern would be if the infrastructure didn't get completed at the same time as the hotel," he said.

A public hearing for the project was scheduled for 10 a.m. on Dec. 23 at Fallsburg Town Hall, surprising some board members.

The scheduling of a morning public hearing two days before Christmas raised concerns that many people will not be able to attend.

"If it's scheduled for the 23rd, it's scheduled for the 23rd, but it seems to go against the board's wishes," board member Sean Rieber said.